Councillors in Midlothian will continue to meet virtually until the summer break after calling the cost of setting up hybrid meetings 'prohibitive'.
A meeting of the newly-elected councillors this week was told that it would cost £200,000 to set up a new system for hybrid meetings, which allow some people to attend physically while others can take part via the internet, with annual costs of £96,000.
In contrast, officials revealed that a previous webcasting service which councillors axed just prior to the country going into lockdown, had cost them just £11,000 a year to run.
